Harvard’s “Revenue Experiments”
Posted on May 15th, 2013 in Uncategorized | 9 Comments »
The New Yorker has a really fine piece on MOOCs, largely focused on Harvard, in this week’s issue.
Lots to say about it which I will try to do ASAP.
But one thing that’s striking: The rationales proposed for Harvard’s push into online education are almost entirely financial. The argument about bringing higher education to the world gets some face time, but not a lot. It’s hard not to think that this isn’t just about expanding the brand.
One other thing: At one point in the article, Drew Faust seriously considers the possibility of having student essays graded by computer. In the end, she comes down somewhat against it, but in a way that suggests she’s prepared to change her mind. This is not encouraging.
She also talks happily about a course called “Science and Cooking,”—”I just have this vision of people cooking all over the globe together”—thus inadvertently raising the question of whether Harvard’s MOOC courses will be as intellectually serious as a Harvard course ought to be.
9 Responses
5/15/2013 7:59 pm
You should check out the Science and Cooking website. It looks far more intellectually serious (as well as genuinely *useful*) than most gen ed science classes aimed at nonmajors.
http://www.seas.harvard.edu/cooking
5/15/2013 8:02 pm
This short video gives a bit of the flavor of what is involved. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3v8eFwDWnk&feature=youtu.be
5/16/2013 6:32 am
Yes, RB, a snobbishly raised eyebrow. Science of cooking is a peculiar course, but certainly not a joke. And look at CS50x. But who knows what will happen in the future, certainly bears watching.
Since you raise the revenue issue, some of the salary numbers reported this morning are pretty interesting. Personally I expect the investment managers to receive market-rate compensation, so I just think of those being netted against endowment performance. (I know there is another view on that, that those who manage the assets of public charities should do so for charitable reasons. I don’t buy it.) The salaries of university presidents nationally have reached amazing levels, and I am glad that Harvard by no means looks like an outlier. I don’t remember seeing the other numbers, near the end of the story.
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/5/15/faust-earnings-fiscal-2011/
5/16/2013 8:47 am
Mmm, I wouldn’t say snobbish, Harry, just skeptical. Two classes a week, one taught by a celebrity chef… I took a look at the video and at the course website and thought it sounded like fun. Also: potential gut. (No pun intended.)
I agree with you about the endowment manager salaries. For better or worse, that’s what top talent in that field makes. And agree with you as well about the president’s salary.
5/16/2013 9:31 am
Forgive me. I am always on the lookout for anti-applied-science bias! Not every Gen Ed science course has to feature Newton, Einstein, or Darwin.
Anyway, why stop with courses? Why not a MOOD, a massive open online degree? Ah, too late already — we missed that boat.
http://www.omscs.gatech.edu/announcement/
5/16/2013 11:58 am
It was inevitable…
My feelings on MOOCs are deeply mixed. If I were in Harvard’s place, I’d be pushing forward as well; the fear of being left behind would be too great.
At the same time, I just don’t see how they can measure up to the educational experience of, well, live education. I suspect it’s a question of figuring out what they’re good for and what they aren’t.
5/16/2013 1:37 pm
At least you must be glad that Yale is not following Harvard’s path.
http://news.yale.edu/2013/05/15/provost-polak-appoints-professor-craig-wright-first-academic-director-online-education-cr
Happy diving!
5/19/2013 1:55 pm
http://www.nationofchange.org/blogs/michael-matthew-bloomer/will-jason-richwine-s-retrograde-harvard-ph-d-dissertation-iq-and-immi
5/19/2013 3:02 pm
The Jason Richwine dissertation controversy illustrates several serious problems at Harvard:
1. Faculty who still approve dissertations even though they are clearly past their time.
2. Faculty who supervise dissertations on which they have no substantive expertise -no one on Richwine’s committee knows the first thing about intelligence testing.
3. Marginalization of the Kennedy School from other schools at Harvard that have relevant expertise in domains KS faculty and students want to opine, without the benefit of deep knowledge.
4. Harvard will now be embarrased because many people will be reading Dr. Richwine’s dissertation and conclude ‘is THIS kind of work that earns someone a doctorate at Harvard?’ The response of Dr. Richwine’s supervisor, Professor Borjas is PATHETIC ‘the work was methodologically sound’… as if sound methodology can compensate for inadequate command of the relevant scholarly literature and constructs, deficient measurement and understanding of relevant outcomes, inadequate policy inferences and unwarranted generalizations based on evidence…
There will be, no doubt, many arguing whether this research is racist, whether it should have been done, what about academic freedom, but the real issue here is that this kind of poor scholarship is conducted at Harvard University, sanctioned by Professors and voted by the entire faculty to earn someone a doctorate when this deficient work would so obviously not have obtained a doctorate at most other comparable institutions in the United States.
It is unfortunate when people confuse PRESTIGE with SCHOLARLY QUALITY and, apparently, at Harvard, the two are sometimes confounded.